


Catch me if I fall

by flusteredkeith



Category: Voltron: Legendary Defender
Genre: Black Paladin Keith, Canon Timeline, Canon Universe, Developing Relationship, F/M, Late night talks, Post Season 2, Red Paladin Allura, Slow Burn, allura tries not to fall for keith, it doesn't work, lots of bonding, prince lotor mention, shiro is still gone
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-03-11
Updated: 2017-03-11
Packaged: 2018-10-02 04:55:34
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 12,864
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/10210058
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/flusteredkeith/pseuds/flusteredkeith
Summary: Ever since the five paladins began to really work together as a team, Allura swore to herself that as long as the universe was at stake, she’d always put their feelings above her own, no matter what the circumstances were. She thought it’d be simple—easy, even. What she didn’t expect, however, was for the complications to arise from within herself.Alternatively, Allura tries not to fall for Keith.(Spoiler alert: it doesn’t work.)





	

**Author's Note:**

> Hey guys! Here I am again. As this fic takes place immediately following the events of S2, it really should have been posted a week after the season dropped but... I'm a slow writer and I had a lot I wanted to think through. But here it finally is! My first Kallura fic! My take on how they might have bonded while looking for Shiro. Hope you enjoy. :)
> 
> Special thanks to the usuals who helped me read over random bits as I was writing and freaking out. You know who you are~ <3

 

Ever since she awoke from her slumber and learned that five teenagers from Earth had gotten their hands on the Blue Lion, she swore to herself that despite any trial or hardships that would be thrown their way, keeping the team together was of utmost importance. Although having Voltron was no guarantee of defeating Zarkon, it was still the best chance the universe would ever have.

So when Shiro disappeared, when everything they’ve worked towards started crumbling to pieces, she was at a loss for what to do. It was new to her, the uncertainty of next steps, this inaction, this paralysis, that when the paladins looked to her for guidance and comfort, waiting for her to tell them that everything was still going to be alright, she didn’t have a single reassuring thing to say. Looking from one desperate face to another, they were all lost, confused, without hope, and it tore her up inside to see them like this.

The argument that followed immediately afterwards in the control deck shook her to the core. A storm broke out and a torrent of harsh words and angry jabs threatened to poison whatever light was left of their team. They shouldn’t be fighting. They shouldn’t be blaming each other. They shouldn’t be going in circles trying to figure out what happened. But ultimately, this shouldn’t even have happened. Shiro shouldn’t have disappeared. Lance and Hunk shouldn’t look this hurt and beaten. Pidge shouldn’t feel pushed to the point where she had to quietly slip away from the room. And Keith—Keith who was usually so stoic and strong-willed—shouldn’t be this close to tears.

This shouldn’t have happened. None of them should ever have to bear the weight of the universe on their shoulders. And yet, here they are.

“ _Keith_!” Lance’s voice punctures the air, shrill and cracked. The sound jars her out of her warring thoughts, forcing her to come back to her surroundings and focus on the situation at hand. When she looks up, she catches sight of Keith stomping out of the room with his helmet tucked under his arm.

“Paladins, please,” she shouts as Lance opens his mouth again and the door slides closed behind Keith. It’s when Hunk cringes and Lance looks at her with a hurt puppy dog look that she realizes only two of the five paladins are still present in the room. Switching tracks at once, she gathers herself and tries again.

“Listen. We’ve all been through a lot tonight and emotions are running high, especially after—after...” she trails off, feeling a lump rise in her throat. Her lips form a tight line as she slowly exhales through her nose and shuts her eyes, willing herself to maintain a strong facade for the rest of them. They’re relying on her for support and she refuses to let them down, refuses to show them any sign of weakness or give them any reason to fear. But try as she might, she can’t bring herself to mention Shiro’s disappearance without letting the confusion and overwhelming defeat shatter her resolve. “It’s—It is what it is. There are several things out of our control right now but, for the sake of clearing the air, I want you all to know that you fought valiantly against Zarkon tonight, going above and beyond what I could have asked of any of you. As such, I don’t blame any of you for what happened with… with the Black Lion. No matter what the universe throws our way, we’re still in this together and we _will_ figure this out.”

“And how do you expect us to do that?” Lance protests, his tone bordering on accusation. She doesn’t blame him. She knows her words sound empty given the events of the night, but it’s the best she can offer them for the time being.

“Look, we can’t handle much more right now in our current state of mind,” she says, “so as difficult as it may be, we need to rest and regather our wits in order to tackle the situation. Please do whatever you need to do to find some peace.”

Hunk shifts his eyes back and forth between them all for a few seconds before muttering “Kitchen,” and stalking off towards the door. As creation and experimentation often seems to calm him, Allura sincerely hopes that cooking will stimulate his brain in all the right ways.

The atmosphere of the room, already somber as it is, sinks further down into a depressive state after Hunk leaves the room. Even Slav hasn’t spoken very much. Lance shrugs and trudges towards the exit after Hunk, leaving Coran and Allura to look helplessly at each other.

Pidge, no doubt, has already sought refuge among her gadgets in the Green Lion’s hangar, and as Allura can trust Coran and Slav to deal with the aftermath appropriately, that leaves Keith, alone and angry, who she suspects will have the hardest time finding peace tonight. If there’s anyone in the castle that needs comfort the most, she decides, it’s him.

“Goodnight, Coran,” she says, giving him a nod as she walks out the door.

The empty hallway feels desolate and cold as Allura heads down towards the sleeping quarters. She’s not even sure what she intends to tell Keith, or if he’ll even want to talk at all. Approaching him has always felt like poking a Weblum in the eye, but she knows she can’t bear to see the team break apart like this. As long as she can stay strong, the rest of them will surely follow.

Coming to a halt in front of Keith’s door, she takes a deep breath to calm herself before raising a hand to the door pad. For a brief second, she pauses there, ideas swirling around in her head as she tries to formulate all the possible topics she could bring up with the red paladin. In his current fragile state, she wants nothing more than to handle him with care. Much to her frustration, however, the loud pounding of her heart refuses to cease, drowning out all semblance of coherent thought, and before her mind can settle on a single thread, before she’s aware of what’s happening, her palm slips forward and punches the touch pad.

The door slides open. Keith doesn’t look up. Still in full paladin armor, he’s sitting on his bed staring at his helmet in his lap. Though his slumped shoulders and tight fists show that he’s still in defense mode, he hasn’t yelled at her to leave. Taking this as a hopeful sign, Allura steps across the threshold without asking for permission. Not wanting to push her luck however, she maintains a safe distance away from his bed.

“I… I know this must be very hard for you,” she begins, testing the waters. “But please don’t think you’re alone in this. We’ve all gone through a huge and difficult ordeal tonight but none of us are going to accept the situation at hand. We will not stop until we find him.”

He still doesn’t look up. She holds her breath in anticipation as she observes the lines in his face and the bags under his eyes. With his eyebrows knotted together and bangs stuck to his forehead from dried sweat, Keith’s expression is nothing short of wretched. And yet, there’s not a single trace of a tear upon his cheeks. It’s almost worse this way. An icy chill runs down her spine at the sight of this, frosting over her heart until it threatens to shatter into a million pieces.

“Keith,” she tries again, doing her best to piece together the right words to say. “Shiro has always said we’re stronger together, so that’s how we’re going to figure this out. Together. As a team.”

“There’s no team without Shiro,” he says harshly.

“You’re right. But we have to figure it out together regardless of whether he’s here or not,” she declares, keeping her tone strong and steady. “Because we don’t have any other choice.”

Keith blinks up at her, his lips tightened in a thin scowl.

“Please,” she continues. “You don’t have to shut yourself away from the team like this.”

He shrugs. Shifting her weight from one leg to the other, she hesitates for a few moments, trying to come up with another angle to approach him with. It’s a given that Keith is beyond distressed at Shiro’s disappearance. They’re close; she knows this. But she also knows he isn’t the only one whom Zarkon has stolen from. She’s lost her father, her entire planet, her entire race—no one else aside from Coran could possibly understand how deep the pain cuts. But as much as she wants him to understand how much they’ve both lost to Zarkon, she can’t force it upon him; it’s up to Keith to choose to see it for himself.

She clears her throat and takes a small step forward.

“May I sit with you?” she asks in a soft voice. He raises his head and eyes her with a shrewd look. Intending to wait as long as she needs to, she stays standing there without wavering from her stance. Eventually, his tightened lips loosen and he gives her the slightest nod.

“Thank you,” she says, walking over and settling herself down on his bed next to him.

In silence, they sit; her with her elbows resting on her knees and him still holding onto the helmet in his lap. Although no words are being shared between them, she swears she can hear the tough shell of his heart cracking at the same frequency as her own.

“I know I was being unreasonable,” he says quietly, still staring down at the floor. “For what I said to the others.”

“Yes, you were,” she admits. Out of the corner of her eye, she sees him turn to look at her, his violet eyes fierce and unyielding, but he doesn’t contest. She’s always appreciated this about Keith, the fact that he can handle raw and unfiltered honesty—prefers it, even, to sugarcoated fronts. Having the space to be in this unspoken freedom, she feels the tight knots in her chest begin to uncoil. “But at the same time, I understand why.”

“You do?” he asks, raising an eyebrow. “Somehow, I can’t imagine you lashing out on the team purely out of anger.”

“I don’t need to act the same way you do to understand how you’re feeling,” she says with a wry smile, turning her head to face him. “The situation at hand is critical, yes. Anyone would be riled up by it—you especially. We all handle things differently. You are free to feel… however it is you are feeling about this.”

Keith looks away and stares back down at the ground again. He doesn’t mention it, but Allura can tell by the way his shoulders have slackened that his initial rage is slowly receding. Sighing, he sits up straighter and rearranges his face to resemble more of his usual self—jaw set and perpetually ready for action.

“So what do we do now?” he asks.

With an attempt at an encouraging smile, she places a hand on Keith’s shoulder and matches his determined expression.

“Whatever we can.”

—

Quiet as death, the castle becomes a graveyard, haunted by Shiro’s absence. She hardly gets any sleep that night. None of them do. She can see it in their faces the next morning, the same hollowed, shaken looks.

Keith and Pidge are the only two who don’t show up all day. Not even for meals. The mice tell her that Pidge has been trying to research and understand everything she can possibly get her digital fingerprints on. The amount of important people gone missing in her life is setting her on edge. Keith, on the other hand, has been in the training room all afternoon. Although Hunk and Lance have been supporting each other, she fears that the team is slowly falling apart at its seams. Having all five paladins together with her and Coran has become a law of nature. Like a loose thread coming undone, Shiro’s absence has pulled at what was once tightly knit, and Allura is forced to watch it all unravel.

They need each other. But while Shiro is gone, they have to make do and she intends to stitch whatever they have left back together if it’s the last thing she does.

She doesn’t have enough energy to wonder about what happened to her in the fight with Haggar, or what it means that the Space Witch is Altean. Instead, she lets her own issues run on the back burner. For now, sewing the team back together and finding Shiro are the biggest priorities.

—

At some point, throughout all the conversations and arguments they have about what could have possibly happened to Shiro and what they should do next, Allura suspects that Keith is holding back information.

She has no way of proving this aside from gut intuition. but as Keith has always been the closest one to Shiro, she’s been observing him closer than normal, hoping to find a shred of evidence that she can stealthily bring up later on to wheedle out the goods. But despite being straightforward and blunt, the red paladin is also cryptic and difficult to read when it comes to emotions. Luckily, Allura is nothing if not determined.

“Although we may have defeated Zarkon himself, he’s been building his empire for 10,000 years so there’s still more work to be done, including looking for Shiro,” she brings up one meeting in the control room. “So whether we like it or not, we still need Voltron in the midst of all this.”

After a whole week of trying to skirt around the issue, she doesn’t think they can ignore it anymore. A part of her had kept hoping that Shiro would magically reappear and put all their minds at ease. Then this conversation wouldn’t have had to happen. They would have rejoiced and gone on to face another day of battle rather than sit around and try to decide what to do next. And as taking action is better than inaction, the situation has left her with no choice.

“I hate to say this,” she continues, “but we can’t form Voltron without someone to pilot the Black Lion.”

Hunk and Lance perk their ears up with curiosity. Pidge adjusts her glasses. Keith stiffens. But it’s Coran that’s figured out her motives first.

“Allura, _no_ ,” the mustachioed man pleads. He knows her sense of duty only too well. “It’s too—”

“Too what?” Allura raises herself up, both hands on her waist. “We don’t have a choice.”

“Zarkon’s scope was huge,” Coran says. “It’s too dangerous. We’re not even completely sure how far he’s expanded his empire.”

“Well, what do you propose, then?” she contests.

“Whoa, wait a minute, wait a minute. Are you saying what I think you’re saying?” Lance asks with folded arms and a raised eyebrow.

“Uh, Princess, not to refute your ideas or dispute your skill as a pilot or anything,” Hunk begins, holding an index finger up, “but can I just point out that if you were in the Black Lion and an emergency should occur, who would we count on to wormhole a way out for us?”

“Precisely!” Coran shouts, gesturing wildly towards the yellow paladin in gratitude. “Allura, you know what Zarkon is capable of—”

“Which is exactly why it should be me,” she finishes. “As for the wormhole, there are always solutions around that. It isn’t ideal, but we’d be able to manage.”

“Okay, I don’t know about you guys, but we’ve had way too many close shaves for me to feel completely comfortable with this,” Hunk says. “I mean, is—is that just me? Do you guys see what I’m saying here, or have you all forgotten the times Zarkon nearly had us?”

“No, I mean, I’m actually with Hunk on this one,” Lance pipes up. “We’ve had _far_ too many close calls.”

“No offense to you or anything, Princess,” Pidge adds, “but I think even Slav would say that if you piloted the Black Lion, there’d be no realities that exist in which we get out of this alive. I’m sorry, but I'd have to agree. Without Allura manning the castle during critical points in a battle, the chances of survival will tank.”

“We don’t have a choice,” Allura maintains. Only one person hasn’t spoken yet. Turning her head to the red paladin, she asks, “Keith, what do you think?”

Her eyes lock onto his as Keith looks up and she sees her firm resolve mirrored back in them.

“I think Allura should pilot the Black Lion.”

“What?” Lance squawks. “Are you crazy? You’re crazy. Are you all hearing this guy? He’s crazy!”

“You heard what the Princess said,” Keith says firmly. “It isn’t ideal but we don’t—we don’t have another choice.”

He finishes the sentence on a subdued note, and when Keith looks away, Allura notices it. Upon seeing his face, she recognizes the same shifty eyes and avoidant gaze from the night they had caught each other trying to leave the castle during Zarkon’s chase. Though the situation is not as obvious as finding Keith sneaking around the pods with a bag of his belongings, one thing is clear to Allura.

He’s holding back from telling them something.

“Oh, come on!” Lance interjects. “Are you going to ignore the majority vote here and side with the hothead?”

“Are you quite sure you don’t have any alternative ideas, Keith?” Allura asks before Keith can argue back with Lance.

“I—no,” he says, looking down at the floor. “I don’t. There are only six of us now. You’re a capable leader who’s been leading us this whole time. It’s the best option we have.”

“Thank you, Keith,” she says, though she makes a mental note to confront him about his guilty look later when she can. “Then we will discuss this topic no further.”

“Princess, please think about—”

“Pidge,” Allura cuts across Coran. “Have you discovered any theories as to Shiro’s whereabouts?”

“I tried to access the micro-storage strands in the Black Lion to see if I could extract any information or play back the events of what happened through the Black Lion’s head… but I don’t think the lions work like that. I was getting feedback on some strange anomaly but I couldn’t seem to crack it,” Pidge replies, adjusting her glasses. “I also ran some tests on the black bayard and collected DNA samples to cross-reference with the data I’d already obtained from Shiro’s arm because there’s something about all of this that confuses me. How exactly did Shiro get the bayard back?”

“Huh. Good point, Pidge,” Lance says, his eyebrows furrowed in concern. “I never thought of that being connected to him vanishing.”

“Not surprising,” Keith quips under his breath.

“Paladins, please,” Allura chides before turning back to Pidge. “What did you find out when you examined the bayard?”

“I don’t know,” she frowns. “Nothing new or significant. I’m still not sure how he got the bayard back.”

“Any thoughts on this, Keith?” Allura asks, focusing her gaze back on the red paladin.

“Why are you asking me?” Keith responds.

“Yeah, why are you asking him?” Lance tacks on, offended.

“You were closest to Shiro,” Allura explains, ignoring the typical staredown now happening between Keith and Lance. “Did he ever mention anything about his bayard at all to you?”

“I don’t think so,” Keith says, turning back to her. “Your guess is as good as mine.”

“So far, with what little information we actually have, I think it’s at least safe to say that Shiro was able to traverse the physical boundaries of his lion somehow,” Pidge offers. “But apart from that, we barely have anything to go off of. There are too many variables and not all of them can even be tested in a lab. But I’ll do what I can.”

“It’s a start,” Allura sighs. “Thank you, Pidge.”

“I’ll go test some of my theories now,” Pidge says, getting up out of her seat and walking towards the exit with a lazy wave of her hand. “You know where to find me if you need me.”

“Well then,” Allura says, her jaw set. “While Pidge is doing research, I’m going to try and bond with the Black Lion.”

—

Her hair is tighter than ever in her bun as she heads down towards the Black Lion’s hangar with her helmet tucked under her arm. Every step she takes is heavy with apprehension and her lungs threaten to cave in with the weight of the team on her shoulders.

There’s a reason she felt that telling the others about Zarkon being the original black paladin would tarnish their experience of bonding with their lions. Even now, as she stands in front of the giant feline lying in the same position from when they last left it, her heart feels the immense burden of the former paladins’ messy history. The betrayal of her father, the destruction of Altea, and to add salt to the wound, the lion’s interior is probably still besmirched with Zarkon’s fingerprints.

10,000 years is too long. It’s a stretch of time she can hardly fathom and yet for her, due to the inconveniences of a sleep chamber, it still feels like yesterday. A stitch forms in her chest but she tries to keep it from rising up in her throat. WIth great difficulty, she swallows the emotions and takes a gulp of air.

 _You can do this_.

Reaching out a hand, she places her palm against the lion’s jaw and looks up at its eyes, hoping and willing for the Black Lion to respond, to receive her. In the dim stillness of the hangar, she waits with bated breath.

A minute passes. Then two. Nothing happens. No gleam of light glinting in the lion’s eye, no movement or turn of its head—no acknowledgement at all. Sighing, she bows her head and leans her forehead against the cool metal surface of the lion.

“Please,” she whispers, hearing her voice crack. “I know I’m not Shiro but we _need_ Voltron. Is my determination to protect the lions and the team not enough to earn your respect?”

Another few seconds pass but the Black Lion still doesn’t budge. Admittedly, out of all the concerns she’s had—not being able to fly as well as the others, not being able to see through the lion’s eyes, not being able to form Voltron—she hadn’t considered outright rejection.

“Come on, work with me,” she says, shutting her eyes tight and concentrating all her energies into bonding with it. Now that she’s in this position, she reflects that she really ought to have gone easier on the paladins when they first started out. But regardless of how difficult it is to bond with a lion, her will to defeat Zarkon was ironclad and she had always believed in the paladins from day one.

It’s just that sometimes, she really needed someone to believe in her for a change.

The thought makes her feel more alone than ever. Immense pressure seizes up inside her chest and threatens to collapse in on her, causing her legs to tremble.

 _“I miss you, Father_ , _”_ she whispers as she sinks down to her knees.

Resting her head against Black’s metal claws, she tries to steady her breathing as it’s suddenly become difficult to swallow. Perhaps the team had been right all along—she was never meant to pilot a lion.

It takes her a while to understand why the rejection has upset her so much in the first place. It’s not like she had been pinning her hopes and dreams on herself to pilot the Black Lion only to find out it isn’t going to accept her. But to think that nobody else on this earth wants to see Zarkon’s empire defeated more than she does and to have that _not_ be enough to fight as a paladin—well. The lack of validation cuts deeper than she’d expected. No one else understands better than she does the need for Voltron and yet, it doesn’t seem to be what the Black Lion wants.

Sighing, she keeps her eyes shut tight and doesn’t let the tears fall. She must remain strong.

Just then, she hears a soft whirring. Looking up, she sees a glimmer of a wink in the Black Lion’s eye and stands up at once, stumbling backwards slightly in the process. The lion shifts its paws aside and opens its mouth, letting the ramp fall at her feet.

For a moment, she stares at the entrance, not quite believing it to be real. The Black Lion’s jaw still feels rather intimidating and suspicious. But after a few more seconds pass and it’s clear that the way is open to her, she wipes her eyes and smiles.

“Thank you,” she says with a polite bow of her head.

As she walks up through the mouth and into the cockpit, the door slides open for her. It’s as dark and lonely as the last time they were all in here, confused and scared when they found Shiro’s empty seat. The mystery of it, on top of the memory of Zarkon’s paladin days, still haunts this space. But she can’t give up now. She has bonding work to do.

Taking a deep breath and letting it all out, Allura edges around the chair and sits herself down in it. Given how large the seat is, with its cushioned back refusing to conform to her curved hips, she feels like an unworthy peasant sitting in a giant throne. With caution and gentleness, she places her hands on the stick shifts and adjusts her grip, trying to mold her palms to the handle bars. No matter how she wriggles her hands, the controls and mechanics of it feel foreign to her, or rather, _she_ is foreign to everything in here.

 _You can do this_ , she reminds herself.

Closing her eyes, she refocuses her mind on the Black Lion, trying to attune herself to anything it might be trying to tell her. One by one, her brain works hard to strip away each thread of irrelevant thought from the forefront so that there is space to listen and understand.

But try as she might, _“nothing is happening”_ is still the most interesting thing to pass through her mind. With a small huff of disappointment, she pushes herself harder, willing her thought pattern to weave together with the lion’s. The ticks count off in her head but she can barely hold on to the Black Lion’s presence—it keeps slipping away from her like water trickling through her fingers.

“Stay with me,” she says to it. The visions in her mind begin to shift, sifting through layers and layers of feelings and impressions. She sees her father, standing tall and proud amidst a field of mountain juniberries—(she can almost smell the flowery scent). The image of him shifts and is replaced by the paladins, fighting together and forming Voltron for the first time. Her heart swells with relief and pride at the sight of them. She continues to smile fondly at the memories, allowing the various images to keep flowing through her head, growing progressively more and more abstract. Shiro’s apprehension when he tells everyone he’s going to bond with the lion. Shiro’s uncertainty about Black painted in a whirlwind of color. Shiro’s feelings of curiosity and wonder at a dark purple expanse. Shiro’s fear and distress, then dread, then—Zarkon. Zarkon’s menace. Zarkon’s betrayal. Zarkon—

A violent flash of his yellow eyes crosses her mind as a white hot flame sears licks the insides of her skin and—

“Stop!” she cries out, her eyes snapping open at once, darting around the cockpit in panic. Her breathing is short and ragged, but when she confirms by her surroundings that she’s still safe in the hangar, she sighs and leans back in the chair.

Her body, though calm and slack on the surface, feels shaken up to the core on the inside. The burning sensation couldn’t fade more slowly. In a desperate attempt to release some steam, she slams her forehead against the glove compartment and lets out a cry of frustration. Although Zarkon’s bond with the Black Lion has weakened, the tragic history of it all still haunts her personally. It makes her blood boil in rage and indignation. But whatever it is that has happened, there’s no turning back now. They need Voltron, so until they find Shiro, she knows she must overcome it.

After a few more ticks, she sits up straight, determined to try again. But then—

“Princess Allura, are you there?”

Coran’s voice, echoing just beyond the lion’s exterior, jolts her out of concentration and she shakes her head to clear it. Before she can properly assemble herself into her cool and collected self, her fellow Altean bursts through the door behind her, sounding slightly out of breath.

“Princess, are you okay?” he asks, putting a hand on the chair and peering down at her. “You don’t look too good. I know you want to bond with the Black Lion but you really ought to make sure you’re taking breaks. It’s a good thing I thought to come and check up on you.”

Allura tilts her chin upward to give Coran a guilty look. She knows he means well and wants the best for her but she also can’t help being annoyed at how overly anxious he can get sometimes about her wellbeing. Then again, given the experience she’s just had with the Black Lion, perhaps he has a valid point there, (not that she’s ready to admit it anytime soon).

“But Coran, having someone pilot the Black Lion is urgent and essential for our quest to find Shiro and fully put an end to Zarkon’s empire,” she contests. “You of all people should know that.”

“You won’t be any good to us if you keep draining yourself like this,” Coran advises, his voice laced with concern. He touches the back of his hand to her forehead. “You’re burning up, Allura. Come on, let’s get you back to your room. You need rest.”

And without further protests, she takes his hand and allows him to lead them both out of the hangar.

—

The first thing she feels when she wakes the next morning is vague disappointment and it takes her a few minutes to remember why.

Turning over onto her side, she sighs. No matter what Coran or the others say, she’s determined to try and try again until they can all form Voltron together. But since Coran—obviously biased—had been giving her a hard time last night as they walked back up from the hangar, Allura checks her tick timer and, seeing as she woke up earlier than usual, decides to have another go with the Black Lion before the rest of the castle wakes up.

After she gets dressed and pulls her hair back in the usual tight bun, she heads down to the hangar, her resolve to bond with the lion renewed. Since the first attempt was less productive than she had hoped, her mind runs through a list of other things she could try as she approaches the lion. Perhaps taking it on a test flight, or trying to have a conversation as opposed to quieter meditation.

But before she can decide on which method to try first, when Allura steps into the lion’s mouth, she hears a faint, masculine voice speaking on the other side of the door. Eyes narrowing in suspicion, she tilts her ears closer to the sound, trying to make out who it could be.

_…Shiro?_

Her heart jumps into acceleration at the notion that, after a whole week of stress and tension, somehow Shiro has made it back. The team can finally go back to normal and there won’t be a need for her to bond with the Black Lion anymore. The excitement coursing through her veins drives her to burst through the sliding doors without another thought.

“Shiro?” she exclaims breathlessly as she runs in. “Shiro, are you here?”

Allura fixes her eyes on the center of the cockpit upon entering the room, expecting to see the top of the black paladin’s helmet peeking out from over the back of the chair, but it isn’t there. Unless he’s slouching in his seat…

As she steps closer, she cranes her neck to peer around, trying to get a better view.

“Hello?” she asks, her tone uncertain. Maybe Coran was right. Maybe her failed attempt at bonding has affected her mentally more than she initially thought and she’s now hearing voices when she’s inside the lion. Placing her hand on the chair, she holds her breath and looks down.

“Hi,” Keith says, glancing up at her with a guilty expression on his face as he slides further down in his seat.

“Keith?” she blinks in surprise.

Confusion settles in; then genuine curiosity.

“What are you doing here?” she asks with a raised eyebrow.

“Uh…” he shifts his eyes down to the floor, looking uncomfortable. She can’t really fathom a reason why he’d have the need to visit the Black Lion. Maybe he just really missed Shiro and wanted to be as near to him as possible, but feels awkward admitting it.

Changing tactics to bring out the same sweet-and-innocent snooping mode she once pulled on Pidge, she gives him an encouraging smile and folds her hands together.

“Don’t worry,” she says, adjusting her voice so as to sound brighter and more inviting. “Whatever it is, you can feel free to tell me. This is a safe space. No judgment whatsoever.”

“Allura, it’s not that, it’s just…” he grimaces, side-eyeing the control panel in front of him.

Following his gaze, she looks up at the Black Lion’s dashboard, which she now notices are all lit up and fully functional, something that definitely has not happened for her.

“Keith,” she says, dropping her friendly note at once and adopting a more suspicious one. “Um,”—she points an index finger at the dash—“I was not aware that you were able to do that. Care to explain?”

For a few seconds, Keith doesn’t say anything. Then, with a resigned sigh, he frowns and turns around in his seat to face her properly.

“Actually, this isn’t the first time it’s happened,” he says.

“And when were you going to let me—let all of us—know about this?” she demands. Although he looks appropriately guilty upon getting caught, he shows no sign of remorse nor any intention to back down from Allura’s accusatory tone.

“I wasn’t,” he admits.

“Why not?” she asks, placing her hands on her hips. He shrugs.

“I don’t think it’s supposed to be me,” he says.

“But you—you’ve bonded! More than once!” she reasons. “That _has_ to mean something.”

“No it doesn’t,” Keith counters. “If bonding with a lion made you worthy to pilot it, then Zarkon should have the Black Lion.”

“Well what makes you think it’s supposed to be me?” she asks, giving him a sharp look.

“You said at the very beginning when we all met that the black paladin has to be a “born leader,” or—whatever,” he says with an indifferent wave of his hand. “Obviously, that pointed to Shiro. But… it also fits you. So I thought, why not give it a chance?”

“Even though you knew you had already been able to pilot her before?” she points out.

“It seemed like a reasonable shot.”

“And what about now?” she asks. “Now that we know the Black Lion won’t bond with me.”

“That’s, uh, the real reason why I was here,” he says, his eyes shifting up to meet hers. “To ask her to give you that chance.”

At these words, a warm and tingling sensation begins to weave itself in between Allura’s ribs. Keith gives her a casual one-shouldered shrug, looking so nonchalant and matter-of-fact as he lists off these points that a strange heat rises in her ears. Determinedly ignoring this sudden response (and the accelerated pounding of her heart), she takes a deep breath and clears her throat.

“How did you know she was giving me a hard time?” she asks.

“I heard you and Coran last night,” he says. “It didn’t make sense to me why it wouldn’t work. So I came down here this morning.”

“And what happened the first time you piloted the Black Lion?” she asks.

“Shiro was injured and in trouble,” he answers. “It was after we went through the corrupted wormhole and got separated. My lion was busted and we were alone, so I had to step in and do something.”

“Did Shiro say anything afterwards?” Allura prompts. “It’s no small deal that you were able to pilot his lion.”

Keith turns back around in his seat and frowns. His extended silence says it all. Walking over, she settles herself on the lion’s dashboard and leans forward towards him, elbows on her knees.

“I’m sure it was important,” she says, arranging her face so as to show sympathy and concern. Tilting his head up to her, he takes an exasperated breath and concedes.

“He told me that if he didn’t make it, he wanted me to lead Voltron.”

Silence fills the room. It doesn’t surprise her that Shiro would say that to him, but the fatalistic state of mind that the former black paladin must have been in troubles her. Straightening up, her eyebrows furrow as she touches two fingers to her temple.

“So he knew,” she states, more to herself than to Keith.

“I don’t know what he knew, and I didn’t think anything was going to happen to him,” Keith says, fists tightening their hold around the stick shift handles. “But it’s what he said.”

“Why didn’t you tell us?” she asks again, dropping her hand back down to her lap. Keith looks down with a sad look on his face.

“Because acknowledging it would mean accepting that Shiro’s gone,” he mutters under his breath.

“Keith,” she says. “I don’t think it’s a coincidence that the Black Lion has shown you its favor. The lions and their pilots have always had a special bond, as you very well know given the amount of times Red has come out to save you. If Shiro, who is bonded to the Black Lion, wanted you to lead, it’s quite clear that it has to be you.”

His eyes change from sorrow to anger at these words and Allura can feel a storm coming.

“Why would he make me the leader?” he blurts out. “I’m not like him. I’m not like him at all.”

“Because he trusts you,” Allura responds. Keith blinks his gaze away from her but doesn’t say anything. “Look. I strongly believe that because Shiro knows you well, he knew what he was doing. He’s always believed in you. He knows you are capable of so much more. And so do I.”

“I’m not really a ‘born leader,’” he insists, throwing air quotes around the phrase out of bitterness, she suspects.

“Keith,” she says, placing a hand on his shoulder with a grip that forced him to look back at her. “If you recall, I also said the black paladin is ‘someone whose men will follow without hesitation.’ You may not be Shiro, but I think over time, you’ve come to prove yourself as someone that the rest of the paladins will follow, should you lead us into battle.”

“Us?” Keith repeats back to her.

“Well,” she says, releasing her hold and folding her arms. “Someone’s got to pilot the Red Lion in your place.”

Keith looks taken aback by this, and his face falls. Dropping his gaze, he purses his lips in distaste at the idea.

“I know it isn’t ideal, but time is of the essence if we want to work at getting Shiro back,” she says. “It’s for Shiro. We must make do with what we have. You understand?”

She holds his gaze, refusing to let him back down. She can visibly see the internal struggle taking place in his brain, but after a few minutes, with his jaw set and his lips tight, he gives her a cold, hard stare and nods.

“Alright. Let’s do it.”

Allura sighs in relief and leans back on the dashboard. Convincing Keith took more out of her than trying to herd a pack of Yalmors.

“Well, that’s that. Shall we head up to breakfast, then?”

“Yeah,” Keith agrees.

The tense seriousness of the situation still hangs over them as they make their way back up towards the dining hall. In an attempt to lighten the mood, Allura gives Keith a playful nudge in the ribs and with mock annoyance, tells him, “And to think you made me go through that stressful ordeal last night when this entire time, it was supposed to be you all along.”

Keith looks away, but not before she catches a small smile playing on his lips.

—

“Looking lovely in red, pretty lady.”

Allura groans, trying to ignore Lance’s smug expression as she walks into the room, fully dressed in red paladin gear. It puts a bit of a rumple on her grand entrance but on the other hand, she probably ought to have expected it.

“Let’s just… get down to our hangars,” she says, with much less gusto than she had initially intended. Putting on her helmet, she looks around at all three of them, then pauses. “Where’s Keith?”

As if right on cue, the door slides open and Keith walks in with a somber expression on his face and a black helmet tucked under his arm. He fills out the spare black paladin suit nicely but judging by his dipped head and slumped shoulders, he’s still feeling reluctant to fully own it.

“I’m ready.” Despite his misgivings, his voice is even and unwavering. “Let’s go.”

Allura’s not sure why her breath hitches in her throat. Perhaps it’s because she’s so used to seeing Keith in red paladin gear that seeing him in this new arrangement stands out to her. Somehow, the black and white armor makes the temperamental man look more solemn and level headed than usual and she’s hit with the striking idea that Keith can be all of those things at once, and—as Shiro has undoubtedly always believed—with the potential to be even more.

Keith is more complex than she had ever imagined. It’s refreshing to say the least.

“Princess?” he asks, concerned. It takes her a while after refocusing her attention back to their surroundings to realize that the others have left the room already. “You okay?”

Putting on a determined smile in response, she nods.

“Ready when you are.”

—

At some point, Allura and Keith start training together. Given the prospect of bonding with new lions, she suggests to Keith that since the Black Lion bonded easily with him given his close ties to Shiro, perhaps she ought to get to know Keith better as well. And since the training deck is one of the few places she knows Keith feels at home in, she finds him there the next day and brings it up to him.

“So you think training together will help you bond with the Red Lion?” he asks after she shares her theories.

“More or less,” she nods, circling slowly around him with her bo staff in hand. By default of being in combat mode, she observes his stance and posture with cold calculation, making note of the vulnerable position of his left leg. “Physical combat can be a sort of dialogue, if you will. And I can tell it’s where you feel most comfortable. Unless you don’t want to.”

“It’s fine,” he shrugs, wiping a bead of sweat from his forehead with the back of his hand. “We can do that. Did you want to fight with the bot?”

“Hmm,” she muses as she comes to a stop and faces him directly. “Not exactly.”

And with that, she charges towards him at a run. Instincts as quick as ever, Keith blocks her swing at once with his sword and dodges her next one, twisting himself away from her in mild shock.

“Okay, not what I had in mind,” he admits. With a smug smile, she runs forward at him again and within the next minute, knocks his sword out of his grip and pins him to the floor, her hand over his chest. Breathing heavily, he looks up at her, his deep indigo eyes turning sharp and focused at the challenge.

“I hope you’re not going easy on me just because I’m a Princess,” she taunts, a glint of warning flashing across her features.

“Wouldn’t dream of it,” he says before grabbing her wrist and knocking her legs out from under her with his foot. Flipping her over, he pins her down instead, a shadow of a smirk on his lips.

Smiling, Allura knows they’re going to have fun with this.

And so, in the last week and a half, amidst responding to distress calls and gathering resources from different planets and Pidge’s research, she and Keith fall into a comfortable pattern of finding each other on the training deck a few hours before dinnertime nearly everyday.

The sessions are productive and Allura can feel the Red Lion slowly warming up to her. A small part of her can’t help but wonder if this means the lion’s former paladin is warming up to her as well.

She shuffles the thought away to the back of her mind. Things are serious enough as it is without minor complications.

—

Allura suspects that sleepless nights will become a regular occurrence now. Although she feels closer to the other paladins more than ever by having to bond with them through forming Voltron, there’s still a sense of restlessness festering among the team. Despite their best efforts to remain hopeful, the anxiety and fear about the unknown continues to creep through the castle, and her heart never feels quite settled.

On most days, Allura has learned to fall asleep despite the restlessness. But tonight, lying between the sheets with her eyes wide open, she can’t think of anything else besides how behind she is compared to the other paladins. Even if Lance, Hunk, and Pidge had a head start in deepening their connection with their lions, the urgency of their situation with Shiro missing should have meant she’d be able to catch up quicker than she has currently been doing. More than anyone else, the pressure she feels to excel, and excel quickly, should have been able to push her to greater heights than she’s been currently achieving.  
  
Allura flips over onto her side to try and get a more comfortable sleeping position. And besides, if Keith has been able to make progress with the Black Lion so quickly, shouldn’t she be able to with Red as well? No matter how she goes about it, there’s just no getting around the fact that she’s not as good as the team needs her to be yet.  
  
At the thought of this, she scowls and decides not to waste her energy being angry in bed. Throwing the blankets off of her and sitting up, she swings her legs off the mattress and stands up. Without bothering to change out of her nightgown, she walks out of her room and heads down towards Red’s hangar. If she wants to catch up, she might as well spend sleepless nights doing extra work.  
  
Red sits with her head resting on her claws, just as Allura had left her last. Lifting her gown a bit above her feet so as not to trip over the hem of her nightdress, she steps into the lion’s mouth.

When the doors to the cockpit slide open, however, she hears a movement that sets her on edge, and then—“Allura?”  
  
A mop of black hair appears around the edge of the seat and she lets out a sigh of relief. The former red paladin merely gives her an inquiring look. He really needs to stop appearing unexpectedly like this.  
  
“What are you doing up awake?” Keith asks. Like her, he’s still in his sleepwear, except instead of a nightgown, he’s dressed in a black t-shirt and pajama pants.  
  
“I should ask you the same question,” she says, walking up to him. Placing a hand on her waist, she raises a questioning eyebrow at him. “Why do I keep finding you in the lion I’m supposed to be bonding with?”  
  
“Couldn’t sleep,” he mutters, looking down at his hand, which she now realizes is wrapped around the hilt of his dagger. The insignia glints in the dim lighting as his wrist shifts in his lap. “And…” he looks up at her with a small shrug. “I missed Red.”  
  
Keith doesn’t say anything else—he doesn’t need to. Allura can hear his vast affection for the lion swimming beneath the surface. She feels his longing for Red’s comfort in her own heart.  
  
“I couldn’t sleep either,” she says, her eyes lowering to the floor. She can’t seem to bring herself to meet his gaze. “But, um. Well, I—I didn’t mean to impose. If you miss Red. I should—I can go back up to my room perhaps and let you two—”

“It’s fine,” Keith says, and Allura looks up at him. “You can stay. If you’d like.”

Seeing as she knows that Keith is a private person, the thought that he’d invite her to remain in his sacred space causes a tiny spark to ignite inside her chest.

“Thank you.” She smiles in response. “I’d like that.”

“Here,” he says as he gets up out of the seat and leans his elbow on the back of the chair. “You should sit. It's your lion to bond with now.”

“I—alright,” she says as she moves to sit down.

They lapse into a mutual silence. Allura stares down at the controls in front of her and tentatively reaches out to place her hands on them. The metal still feels cold and foreign beneath her thumbs, sending a chill through her fingers and down her spine, wiping out the previous warmth she had felt just now from Keith’s invitation. Dealing with Red’s stubbornness has never been easy but in light of another sleepless night and the pressure to do better than she currently has been, her already heavy heart sinks further down in her chest, leaving a stinging pain swelling inside.

“Keith,” she finally manages to say, and she’s surprised to hear how hollow her voice sounds. “Did you ever feel… inadequate with Red?”

“I, um, I don’t know actually,” he replies. “If I have, I never stopped to think about it.”

“I see.” Allura drops her gaze down to the floor, trying to stem the emotions stinging behind her eyes. “Shiro has always spoken highly of your piloting skills, so… it makes sense.”

She hears a crick as Keith kneels down beside her and she turns her head away from him. She hates crying, especially in front of the likes of her teammates, who are depending on her to be strong.

“Hey,” she hears him say, his voice full of a softness she’s never heard before. It makes her heart swell even more. “You okay, Princess?”

“I’m fine,” she breathes, trying but failing to keep herself from sounding airy. She wishes he would stop looking at her.

Out of the corner of her eye, as if reading her mind, she sees him turn away and look upwards at the ceiling with a resigned sigh.

“We don’t have to talk about it,” he offers. She’s grateful; there’s no hint of accusation in his voice as he settles into another lapse of silence with her.

Funnily enough, it’s his ready acceptance of her complex feelings as they are that gives her the encouragement to open up. When she opens her mouth to speak, however, she finds her throat too constricted to make a sound. Taking a deep shuddering breath, she steadies herself and tries again.

“It’s just—I thought—” she begins, her eyes turning up towards the ceiling in hopes of holding her tears in better. “I thought we’d be further along by now—that I’d be further along by now. I thought by now, we’d have gotten Shiro back, helped restore order to the universe and set everything right again. And Zarkon—even though he’s gone—the weight of everything he’s done in the last ten thousand years is still catching up to us. And we’ve come so far, we can’t fail now. And yet, I still can’t seem to bond properly with Red and I—”

She takes another deep breath to steady herself. It’s an amazing feat, really, that she’s somehow managed to hold back the torrent of emotions threatening to pour forth. Feeling Keith’s tentative hand on her shoulder, she bows her head, still avoiding his gaze. The tears don’t come, but she’s afraid that they might if she continues speaking.

“I’m sorry,” she mutters, because it feels like the right thing to say.

“Don’t be,” he responds. “You’re being too hard on yourself. Ten thousand years isn’t going to fix itself overnight.”

“I know, but—”

“And you know,” he adds, “for someone who believes in the whole ‘we’re stronger when we’re together as a team’ thing, you sure don’t let anyone else carry your burdens.”

“I—it’s not—I, well—” she stutters, trying to think of a loophole in her defense. “No, it’s just… I don’t want any of my own problems to prevent everyone else from focusing on the goal.”

“You said we were a team,” he says. “We all have our setbacks. Would you tell the others they were preventing the rest of us from defeating Zarkon if one of them was going through what you’re going through now?”

“No, but—”

“Look,” he continues. “If you asked anyone on this ship how they’d feel if they knew you were going through these internal battles, I’m sure they’d tell you that they would do anything they could to support you.”

Then, with a small smile and a one shouldered shrug, he adds, “That includes me.”

Allura turns to face him, her lips parted in mild surprise. Keith is often far from being the comforting type, but in this moment, his hard-headedness and confident belief that she has no reason to feel alone means more than she can say. And besides, she thinks as she takes in his kind expression, she finds herself starting to really like that small smile.

“Okay,” she says, wiping her eyes with an index finger. “Will you work with me on strengthening my bond with Red? I hate feeling like I’m dragging the team down.”

“You’re being too hard on yourself,” he repeats, looking concerned. “But sure. I will.”

It’s only when he takes his hand off her shoulder as he stands back up that she realizes how fast her heart has been pounding.

—

She’s not sure when things began to shift. When the ground beneath her started to crumble, leaving her standing at the edge of the precipice. Perhaps it had happened during one of their training sessions when Keith held onto her wrist a little longer than necessary, her pulse beating wildly beneath his fingertips as their eyes met. Or perhaps it was during dinner a few days ago when he saved the last bit of Juniberry pie for her because he knows it is her favorite. Either way, Allura finds her heart these days teetering on the edge of steep ravine, threatening to fall over into the unknown. Whatever it is, as Allura sits on the dashboard and watches Keith lean back in Red’s pilot seat that night, she tells herself the rush of affection she feels is merely a shift towards a deeper friendship. Nothing less, nothing more.

Even though it’s the sixth time in a row that week that they’ve found each other here.

“Couldn’t sleep again?” she had asked him the second time.

“Same with you,” he observed the third time.

By the fourth time around, the dangerous thought creeps into her mind that she’s thoroughly enjoying these long talks into the night with Keith. And though it may have started out with restless insomnia, as she listens to Keith talk about his childhood with a wistful smile on his face, she can no longer deny that the cause of their sleeplessness has long since changed.

—

For the first time in weeks, the castle falls under attack from the usual squadron of Galra ships. As Allura has suspected all along, the defeat of Zarkon has never meant the defeat of the his Empire.

Fortunately, they wormhole out before any real damage is done.

—

As Galra ships attempt to stay on their tail, rumors of a Prince Lotor reach their ears.

Battles are inevitable, and when they finally find themselves in the middle of another one, Allura is prepared. She’s come a long way with Red and she’s ready to fight.

It’s the same scene every time: scattered Galra ships lining the entire horizon. Although in fear and apprehension, the team’s hearts beat as one as the five of them merge to become Voltron.

“I’ll give you cover from behind!” Coran shouts.

On Keith’s command, Allura forms the sword.

“Okay, guys, we’ve taken down Galra vessels plenty of times before,” Keith says, “You know the drill.”

Charging forward amidst the shots already aimed their way, they glide through the stars at top speed towards the fleet. Her grip tightens around the controls as she thinks of her training sessions. With focus, her muscles remember each movement of swinging the sword, flowing and expanding until she feels as nimble and agile as the Red Lion herself.

In a blur of flame and flashing lights, they destroy one, then two, then three Galra ships. But not for the first time, they find themselves unprepared and outnumbered.

“I think we need to call it quits on this one until we come up with a better plan!” Lance yells as they retreat further away from the oncoming explosions.

“Yeah, the odds are not looking good here,” Hunk seconds, plugging in his bayard to activate the larger gun. “Just how big did you say Zarkon built up his empire?”

“It’s been over 10,000 years, Hunk,” Allura reminds him as they shoot several beams of laser towards their foe. “I’m not even aware of the full scope myself.”

“Yeah, that was rhetorical,” he shouts back.

“Lance is right,” Pidge agrees. “Even though they’re finding us much slower without Zarkon tracking us through the Black Lion, we still need a better plan.”

“Alright. Let’s split up and while the rest of you hold them off, I’ll go back and power the wormhole,” Allura suggests. “Come back when I say it’s time.”

“Sounds good,” Keith says, but before any of them split apart into separate lions, a figure appears from out of the mass of Galra ships.

“Whoa! W-who’s that?” Lance squawks, and Allura can imagine the blue paladin squinting at his holographic display. “Is that—is that… _Zarkon_?”

“Impossible!” Allura breathes. Sweat beads form at the back of her neck as she eyes the newcomer. Fortunately, the figure—clad in Galra armor and a flowing cape—looks much smaller than Zarkon. Unfortunately, he also appears to be holding a large sword, which was now glowing dark purple.

“No, I don’t think that’s Zarkon,” Coran’s voice sounds in her ears.

"Okay, so he’s not the previous alien baddie that tried to kill us, but another evil dude that looks just as crazy. Good to know!” Lance exclaims. “Let’s get out of here!”

The armored figure raises his arm and a dark beam of quintessence shoots out of from the tip of the sword. It misses them by mere centimeters and they nearly lose their balance as they swing around from the blow.

“Guys? We need to do _something_ ,” Pidge says as they fly away, dodging a few more of his attacks.

“Should we split _now_?” Hunk asks. Allura can feel the entirety of Voltron spinning and spiraling across the starry expanse.

“Yes,” Keith says through gritted teeth. “Once we stabilize and—”

“Look out!” Coran gasps. But too late. Whatever quintessence the armored figure was firing had hit them. The screams of the other paladins ring loudly in her ears. Allura shuts her eyes tight from the tingling sensation bubbling beneath her skin. Even beyond dark eyelids, she can see a red glow growing brighter and brighter, and with it, warmth emanates from her chest like a ball of energy reaching higher and higher towards its peak.

Then, with a loud _whoosh_ , the second she completely takes in the quintessence, she feels the pain of a slash as the lions suddenly split apart. Acting as quickly as she can, hands gripping the controls more tightly, she fires, channeling the energy she’s absorbed through Red and out of the lion’s mouth. The beam makes a direct hit, sending the attacker spinning back towards the squadron behind him.

“Whoa, how did you do that?” Lance asks.

“I’m not sure, but there’s no time to speculate now,” she responds. “Are you guys all right?”

“Yeah” Lance replies. “We’re good.”

“We’re fine,” Hunk says. “It wasn’t like last time at all.”

“Yeah,” Pidge adds. “How did you know you could absorb the quintessence and shoot it back?”

“I’ll explain later,” she says. “Keith, how about you?”

Everyone falls silent, waiting to hear his low voice confirm that no harm had been done. But it doesn’t come.

“Keith? Keith, can you hear me?” Allura asks, her heart accelerating with immediate concern.

“Keith? Buddy!” Lance yells over the com.

“Are you there?” Pidge demands.

More silence. Allura looks up at her screen and spots the Black Lion, motionless and drifting in space. Fear grips her as the image of Keith doing the same inside the cockpit flashes across her mind. The seconds pass like minutes as they wait for a response.

“Oh, no,” Hunk says, and his dreaded tone stirs up a sense of foreboding in Allura. “Please don’t pull a Shiro on—”

A scratchy noise crackles in her ears, and then—

“Guys? Guys, I’m here.”

At the sound of his voice, Allura lets out a breath she didn’t know she had been holding. Such an immense wave of relief surges through her that for a moment, she feels lightheaded.

“Keith, don’t scare me like that,” she exhales, her voice barely above a whisper.

“I’m sorry, Princess,” he replies, and suddenly she’s glad the others can’t see the stupidly large grin on her face. “I’ll try not to let it happen again.”

“Can you flirt later, guys?” Pidge interjects.

“W-what?!” Lance splutters.

“What? No,” Keith says. “No, I was just—”

“Pidge, it’s—” Allura begins, intending to argue the point before giving a resigned sigh. Better not fuel the flame anyways. “Nevermind. Let’s get out of here. Hold them off while I’ll go back to prepare the wormhole.”

Taking off towards the castle, she lands safely in the hangar and sprints off towards the control room where Coran is waiting for her. Although Keith hadn’t disappeared like Shiro did, Allura isn’t entirely convinced that he’s fully okay. The amount of time it took for him to respond was far too unsettling and the faster they get out of here, the sooner she can go check up on him.

With a soft purr, the door slides open and Coran greets her with relief. She can barely respond as she catches her breath and runs up to her spot in the center of the room.

“Alright, everyone, I’m on the control deck,” she announces. “Come back now.”

She watches as blue, purple, yellow, and green blurs fly across the screen and towards the castle.

“Okay, we’re in,” Pidge confirms.

Closing her eyes, she places her hand on the consoles before her and concentrates hard. The portal opens before them and they fly through a whirl of stars and color.

The moment they exit, Allura releases her hands and turns around immediately to race back out the door.

“Allura, where are you going?” Coran asks after her. By the end of his question, she’s too far away to respond so she keeps running and running towards the Black Lion’s hangar.

“Keith!” she calls out when she finally reaches the lion. Slouched and looking mildly shaken, he keeps his hand leaning against Black’s jaw as he looks up at her. Running over to him, she takes his arm and places it around her shoulders for support. “Are you okay? We lost you there for a moment. What happened?”

“‘M all right,” he mumbles, shifting part of his weight onto her. He manages a small smile when he sees her concerned expression, and despite the seriousness of the situation, she feels a light flutter in her chest.

“I’m glad,” she says, smiling back. As she helps him walk away from the Black Lion, she hears several footsteps clattering across the floor through the hangar door.

“You okay, buddy?” Lance asks when they reach them. Taking Keith’s other arm, Lance throws it across his shoulders to help Allura support their teammate.

“Yeah,” Keith answers. “I’m fine.”

“Don’t scare us like that again,” Hunk says, out of breath. “We don’t need anymore missing teammates.”

“Speaking of missing teammates,” Keith says, his teeth clenched as he leans against both Lance and Allura. “I think… I think I know where Shiro is.”

“You what?!” Pidge yelps before his words can fully sink into the rest of their minds. “Where? And… how?”

“I’m not sure,” he says. “When that person—that thing, whatever it is—hit us with that quintessence, for a moment, I—well. I’m not entirely sure what happened. It could’ve been my mind playing tricks.”

“Did you get a vision or something?” Pidge prompts.

“Something like that,” he replies. “It was like, a flash into some other plane of existence. One that the Black Lion took me to.”

“Keith, why don’t you tell us everything in as much detail as you can, and then while you rest, Pidge and Slav can do some more research into this,” Allura suggests. The others nod their heads in unison as they make their way back up the castle.

While the others laugh and joke together, Allura tries to tell herself that her concern and relief over Keith’s well-being is no different from normal sentiment between teammates and friends. But even as she walks forward with the rest of them, with his warm breath grazing her neck and her shoulder pressed up against his chest, her heart pounds so loud and fast in her ears, she doesn’t think she can ignore it anymore.

—

Ever since the five paladins began to really work together as a team, she swore to herself that as long as the universe was at stake, she’d always put their feelings above her own, no matter what the circumstances were.

And she thought it’d be simple—easy, even. If she wanted to defeat Zakron’s empire and restore the universe, she knew she’d have what it takes to remain strong and do whatever she could to support them. What she didn’t expect, however, was for the complications to arise from within herself.

They really had come a long way and she doesn’t want to ruin it. What they have now as a team has been built up slowly over time and it would be incredibly selfish to risk it all for her own feelings. But her determination to keep everything under control becomes challenging at their final planning session a week later.

Pidge had pushed the limits of all their minds combined to try and understand how Shiro had gotten stuck on the astral plane. In the end, she and Coran decide to pay the Olkari a visit and consult their scientific allies while Slav, with his understanding of multiple realities, would begin to engineer a device that would help them get Shiro back. Hunk had offered to help, leaving Lance, Allura, and Keith without a job to do—that is, until Slav suggested they reach out and partner with the Blade of Marmora again.

“Will you go alone?” the question tumbles out of her mouth before she can stop herself. She knows the answer even before he gives it.

“It’d probably be a good idea, yeah,” he says. “Not everyone was willing to be friendly the way Antok and Kolivan were, especially before I activated the blade.”

“Well, your lion did attack them,” Lance quips, leaning back in his chair with his arms behind his head.

“And though they were willing to risk their lives against their better judgment,” Keith continues as though Lance hadn’t spoken, “I don’t expect the same of the others. But we know they’re fighting for the same cause.”

“Keith,” she begins, then stops. She has no logical explanation for why she doesn’t want him to go. There was a time when she wanted to hate him for what he came back with from the Blade of Marmora, but they had gotten past that. And now, although she knew the Blade members were their allies, she couldn’t help feeling a sense of foreboding about Keith’s’ impending visit.

 _Keep the team’s needs above your own feelings_ , she reminds herself. But the problem was, she never had a game plan for what she’d do if her emotions ever threatened to overpower her.

“Just be careful,” she says finally.

He nods. “I’ll have to take Red. She can withstand heat better.”

“Of course,” Allura agrees.

“Pidge,” he says, turning to the green paladin. “Can you come with me and make sure Red’s all ready to go?”

“Will do,” she says as she gets up to follow him out the door. It slides closed behind them with a hiss.

While everyone else returns to further discussion of the plans, Allura falls silent. Last time, Keith came back beaten and bruised, and while she’s sure it won’t happen the same way again, her stomach squirms uncomfortably at the thought of him going alone. She knows she can’t stop him, but the desire to tell him the truth arises in her. If she couldn’t stop him, she had to say _something_ , just in case—

 _In case nothing. It’s nothing_ , she tells herself. But even as she thinks it, she knows it’s not true. There _is_ something, but whatever it may be, she doesn’t know if she’s ready to find out.

After struggling with herself for a few moments, she stands up tall, walks away from the wormhole consoles, and leaves the room.

When Allura arrives at the Red Lion’s hangar, the scene that greets her hits her with a rush of familiarity: Pidge and Keith talking in front of his mode of transport as the giant doors slide open. For the first time in ages, her knees shake and her hands are jittery as she slowly approaches them. It’s strange, she’s never felt nervous this way before, as though she were hurtling through a wormhole with no end destination in sight. A feeling of imminent change hangs over her head the closer she gets to Keith. Things had already been changing all along—pieces moving and shifting and falling into place—but as she walks forward with a certainty she hasn’t felt in a long time, she knows without a doubt that this moment, this place, is exactly where her heart would have fallen either way.

Coming to a halt in front of her two teammates, she takes a deep breath and opens her mouth to speak.

“Pidge, could I have a moment alone with Keith?”

Pidge says nothing but raises an eyebrow before adjusting her glasses and stalking past Allura. With a lazy wave of her hand, she calls out, “Have at it—however many moments you need,” before disappearing through the sliding doors.

“Can I help you, Princess?” he asks. She recalls the last time they were in this situation. His shoulders had been stiff, his tone tense and defensive. But while his voice is much softer and welcoming this time, she can’t read his expression at all, though he stands with his shoulders relaxed and his eyebrows furrowed.

Or perhaps she’s just afraid to hope.

It’s only now that she’s faced with answering Keith’s last question that she realizes she has no idea how to actually say what she means to say.

“I—um, I just, um,” she stammers, mentally kicking herself for not having come up with a smoother line to start with. “I just wanted to say—good luck on your mission and, um, please be careful, and…”

She tapers off and bites her lip, looking away from him. Keith raises an eyebrow, perplexed.

“Thanks,” he says, the word trailing into a note of confusion. “Um. Is that all you came here to tell me?”

The implied _‘you could have told me that while Pidge was still here’_ hangs in the air.

“I just…” she tries again, willing her trembling voice to steady itself. “Last time you went to the headquarters, what you came back with changed a lot of things and—well. We’ve been spending a lot of time together in the last few weeks, and since I don’t know what will happen this time you go, I just… I just wanted to say that um,”— _Why is this so difficult?_

“Allura, relax,” he says, taking a step closer and placing a hand on her shoulder. “It’s going to be fine. I think they’ll be more accepting this time around, so it’ll be a smoother—”

“It’s not that,” she says a little too quickly, and when she looks up at him, his sudden proximity catches her off guard, causing her breath to hitch in her throat. “It’s… well.”

Keith continues to stare at her. Although he should be leaving as soon as possible, he waits patiently for her to continue, as though they had all the time in the world.

“To be honest,” she admits. “I’m not sure how to put it into words.”

“Then don’t.”

His voice is firm and unwavering and Allura can see a burning intensity in his indigo eyes daring her to be forthright and bold. He holds her gaze as a million reasons not to act run through her mind—team dynamics, the stakes of the universe, a permanently altered friendship—and yet, despite these complications, all she can feel in this moment is his thumb grazing her bottom lip and his eyes drawing her in, and before she can stop herself, her hand cups the back of his neck and she pulls him forward into a kiss.

And after all this time of trying to navigate the atmosphere with care, she falls through the wormhole anyways—colors, stars, and light explode before her eyes, her head whirls about, spinning faster and faster to the quickening pace of his mouth against hers. She can’t see the end of it but she doesn’t care—not now when her fingers are tangled in the mess of his hair, not now as he’s catching her lip between his teeth. Not now when she knows that, like gravity, there are a few forces in the universe that are too powerful to fight against, and as she melts into his touch, she’s convinced that falling for Keith is one of them.

When she breaks away, she leans her forehead against his, both of them catching their breath. She’s not sure whether she did the right thing or not, but Allura can’t stop the wide grin from spreading across her face. It’s then, as their physical surroundings start coming back to her, that she realizes that nothing has been done to answer the question of where they will end up.

“So what now?” she asks, still breathing hard.

“I guess we’ll just have to wait and see,” he replies.

“I guess so,” she agrees, her eyes staring into his. Then, wrapping her arms around his neck, she rests her chin on his shoulder.

“Come back to us,” she whispers in his ear.

“I will,” he nods.

And with a final swift peck to her forehead, he steps away from her and walks toward the Red Lion.

As she watches him go, a bright red dot growing smaller and smaller in the wide expanse of distant stars and galaxies, she feels a content peace settle inside her heart. Even if falling for Keith meant following a path without knowing where it will end up, as she stands against the walls touching a finger to her lips, Allura realizes that given the option to start over anew, she would choose to fall for him again and again.

**Author's Note:**

> come say hello to me at [flusteredkeith](https://flusteredkeith.tumblr.com)!
> 
> now there's [art](https://yougavewotyugot.tumblr.com/post/160527816025/inspired-by-catch-me-if-i-fall-by)!!
> 
> and [another](https://littlewhitetie.tumblr.com/post/173559608277/to-be-honest-she-admits-im-not-sure-how-to)!!!


End file.
